


The Grocer's Son.

by Lanna Michaels (lannamichaels)



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Comment Fic, Community: fic_promptly, Podfic Available, Time Period: Reign of Gregor Vorbarra, Time Period: Vorkosigan Regency
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-16
Updated: 2010-09-16
Packaged: 2017-10-11 21:51:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/117499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lannamichaels/pseuds/Lanna%20Michaels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clement Koudelka has thought himself as many things over the years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Grocer's Son.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [](http://james.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**james**](http://james.dreamwidth.org/) 's prompt on [](http://fic-promptly.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**fic_promptly**](http://fic-promptly.dreamwidth.org/) : _Vorkosigan Saga, any, he's as surpised as anyone to find he's really good at this_.
> 
> * * *
> 
> Podfic by [](http://via-ostiense.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**via_ostiense**](http://via-ostiense.dreamwidth.org/) is [available here](http://amplificathon.dreamwidth.org/361419.html) and [here](http://audiofic.jinjurly.com/grocers-son). :D

Clement Koudelka has thought himself as many things over the years. A grocer's son. A student. A candidate for admission to the district military academy. An officer. A _disgraced_ officer. A disgraced officer given a second chance.

For a while, he thought himself dead and just hadn't gotten around to not breathing yet.

He hadn't ever expected himself to become a secretary. The fact that it's to the Lord Regent -- _Admiral Vorkosigan_! -- only makes it the more surreal.

And then a war happens. The less said the better.

And then he gets married. That, he'll talk about for the rest of his life.

And then life settles down. He reports to the Residence every morning and leaves it every night to go home. He runs the executive side of the Regency, schedules meetings, attends meetings, takes notes, makes decisions which will have an impact on more people than he's met in his life, writes resolutions, writes private letters, contributes to legislation, tucks Gregor into bed one time, helps coordinate security arrangements, has security arrangements done to him, performs every duty asked of him and some that never are, and when Admiral Vorkosigan asks him his opinion, he gives it.

He just never expected to be any good at this.

He'd called it an impossible job when he'd been given it and he's nearly right. The only reason he ever sees Drou is because she's at the Residence, too. They don't have their first child until the fourth year of the Regency because before then, there's no _time_. Kou has to rewrite a letter to a key member of the opposition seven different times because in the first six, he keeps descending into demanding to know what Count Vorwhatever thinks about the fact that Kou and Drou can barely find time to have sex, let alone for her to spend nine months pregnant and then give birth at any time with any kind of complications, and they need uterine replicator technology immediately so that Kou and Drou can have children as soon as possible.

Somewhere in all of this, Kou realizes he's more annoyed at the General Staff than scared of them. And young Vor ensigns of the sort of family that would go to the caravanserai to sneer at the poor and revel in debauchery, are now calling him sir.

Eventually, funding occurs and uterine replicators begin showing up in places other than ImpMil. Kou feels cheered and then doesn't write the opposition a letter thanking them personally. It would only encourage them to give him more work by demanding more concessions from the Lord Regent, which the Lord Regent will only send back to them with fond derision. And would probably make Kou chair another committee on the spread of comconsole technology and how it can be made to go faster, in punishment.

Kou and Drou end up being high profile test cases for uterine replicators and Kou exercises his sarcasm at fellow proles who want to know which of his daughters were body-births and which came out of a machine. _If you can't tell, then it doesn't matter_. And then he tells them, because it does matter that they can't tell.

Along the lines, Kou realizes he's been practicing politics among High Vor for about ten years and most of the new ensigns coming up don't flinch the first time they see him need his swordstick to walk.

He even has a new title for himself. _Captain_.

He's good at this. It never stops being a surprise, but it hasn't been strange in a long time.


End file.
